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Caves and Cravings

In June, I introduced my clients to Paris by ascending the Eiffel Tower in the afternoon, where we could gaze far across the sun drenched city to the Basilica Sacre Coeur, crowning Montmartre, only to ascend Montmartre late that night up the steps of that monument and look back the opposite direction to see the illuminated city and tower twinkling back at us. Yesterday bore similarities mirror images. We made our way to Roussignac, one of the many pre-historic caves within 30 miles of here, to see absolute herds of mammoths, horses, capricorns, rhinoceros and bisons drawn 15,000 years ago on the caves ceilings and walls. What overwhelmed me traveling several kilometers underground to see such ancient drawings, was man’s intrinsic, inescapable need to create and tell his story in some visual form. When these caves were inhabited by middle Magdalenian people, they were only high enough to crawl in. Like Michelangelo, these first artists drew their stories lying on their backs.

Back on our hilltop medieval village, a mere 8 or so centuries old, we ambled under a clear and starry sky to a lovely restaurant near the top of Limeuil. Sitting comfortably upright on the terrace under ancient wysteria arbors and garden lights, we savored a perfectly prepared repast of Périgord gastronomic delights. Silently licking the last morsels of walnut cake and crème anglaise from my fork, my mind ambled through the day-compressed tour of civilization, from burrowing underground to the beginning of man to this sublime moment of evening exhilaration. And my soul, whatever that enigmatic thing is, felt as full and satisfied as my stomach.